The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1887-07-20
Sailing Wheat-Land.

Agricultural progress is made mainly
through discoveries by experimenting
and by scientific researches, and what
ever tends to advance the farmers in
terests and help them to overcome the
obstacles against which they have to
contend should be made public. The
sage remark that he who makes two
blades of glass to grow where but one
grew before is public benefactor "
is applicable to the progressive farmer,
wherever he may be found. Expert
ments in farming are not always sue
cessful, and many of them are attended
with loss and vexation to the expert
mentors; but occasionally something
useful is found out that amply repays
all past expenditures and trouble. Such
has been the case with some people of
late in the experiment of sailing wheat
land. Last spring Mr.. Joshua Knight
of Ogle county, ILL.,, sowed thirteen
barrels of salt on twenty acres seeded
to wheat, and left strip in the middle
of the piece without salt The ground
on which he sowed the salt produced
over eighteen bushels of good spring
wheat per acre, while that on which
there was no salt was hardly worth
cutting - the wheat being badly
shrunken, injured by rust, chinch-
bugs, etc. | consider this fair test,
and it has never before been published,
though | deemed it of sufficient i'm
portance to report it to the department
of agriculture. A similar experiment
was tried in Iowa last spring, and the
result was published in the Iowa City
a. oil III of
Cedar county tried the experiment of
spreading three bushels of salt broad
cast over two acres of his wheat-held.
The yield was forty bushels per acre,
while the rest of the field gave only
nine and half bushels per acre. The
straw was bright, not being injured by
rust, as the wheat alongside of it was,
and it stood six inches higher" The
following, from the Montreal Gazette,
is apropoS, as it gives the results of
valuables scientific experiments on the
effect of salt on wheat: " In an inter-
esting series of experiments recently
made on the farm of the Royal Agri-
cultural Society of England the ma
nurial value of salt was Enthusiastically
indicated. An acre of wheat dressed
with three hundred pounds of common
salt yielded thirty-nine bushels of grain,
with proportionate amount of straw,
while an adjoining acre, left unmanured,
produced only twenty-nine bushels per
acre, with the straw imperfectly de-
veloped. The entire cost of the crop
is not stated, but this experiment shows
that the additional ten bushels result
ing from the salt were produced at
cost of thirty cents each. In another
case piece of ground intended for
wheat was plowed the preceding
fall and again in May, when it was
sowed with salt, and afterward plowed
before seeding. On the LIST and I'd of
September wheat was sown, at the rate
of two bushels to the acre. The crop,
when harvested, yielded, according to
the estimate of the owner, Mr.. John
Park, not less than forty bushels of
grain to the acre, with luXuriant
growth of straw. From these and
many similar cases the inference seems
to be that salt is specific for the
wheat crop, imparting solidity to the
grain and firmness to the straw. But
it must not be concluded that equally
good results will always follow the APP
plication of salt" From the forego-
ing it seems evident that salt has a
beneficial effect upon wheat-land, and
l hope the farmers will give this mat
ter further trial and report the sue
cess of their experiments for the benefit
of the publicly. b. Derrick.